Holy Rule for Oct. 2

+PAX A blessed feast of the Holy Guardian Angels to all, prayers especially for all members of the American Cassinese Congregation today, as this is their

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, Oct 1, 2007

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+PAX

A blessed feast of the Holy Guardian Angels to all, prayers especially for all members of the American Cassinese Congregation today, as this is their patronal feast. May all our Guardian Angels watch over us and bring us ever closer to God's perfect will for us.

Prayers, please for the spiritual, mental and physical health of the following and for their families and loved ones, and for all who treat or care for them:

Robert, second leg amputation due to diabetes, and especially for his wife.

Mary, a friend of Ann Marie's, the whole message did not come through, so please just pray for whatever she needs. God knows these things.

James, a serious surgery has led to very serious post-op complications.

Jason, bad car accident, brken shoulder and collarbone, abrasions and cuts, he is lucky to be alive and his family is very grateful, so Deo gratias, too! Lord, help us all as You know and will. God's will is best. All is mercy and grace. God is never absent, praise Him! Thanks so much. JL

February 1, June 2, October 2

Chapter 7: On Humility

The fourth degree of humility
is that he hold fast to patience with a silent mind
when in this obedience he meets with difficulties
and contradictions
and even any kind of injustice,
enduring all without growing weary or running away.
For the Scripture says,
"The one who perseveres to the end,
is the one who shall be saved" (Matt. 10:22);
and again
"Let your heart take courage, and wait for the Lord" (Ps. 26:14)!

And to show how those who are faithful
ought to endure all things, however contrary, for the Lord,
the Scripture says in the person of the suffering,
"For Your sake we are put to death all the day long;
we are considered as sheep marked for slaughter" (Ps. 43:22; Rom.
8:36).
Then, secure in their hope of a divine recompense,
they go on with joy to declare,
"But in all these trials we conquer,
through Him who has granted us His love" (Rom. 8:37).
Again, in another place the Scripture says,
"You have tested us, O God;
You have tried us a silver is tried, by fire;
You have brought us into a snare;
You have laid afflictions on our back" (Matt. 5:39-41).
And to show that we ought to be under a Superior,
it goes on to say,
"You have set men over our heads" (Ps. 65:12).

Moreover, by their patience
those faithful ones fulfill the Lord's command
in adversities and injuries:
when struck on one cheek, they offer the other;
when deprived of their tunic, they surrender also their cloak;
when forced to go a mile, they go two;
with the Apostle Paul they bear with false brethren (2 Cor. 11:26)
and bless those who curse them (1 Cor. 4:12).

REFLECTION

The stumbling block here is the part about holding "fast to patience with
a silent mind." How on earth does one begin to do that? The trend in
consumerist Western society is pretty much to form people- no, let's
call them what consumerism does: "consumers"- in a mold that ALWAYS
listens to very noisy minds. That, after all, is the root of desire
and consumption (clever play on words there! Just think of the old
name for tuberculosis,) and profit. Nothing else matters as much to a
consumerist society.

It's not surprising that living, moving and having our being in such
waters, we more or less acquire consumerist gills in order to
breathe. However, the Gospel itself, as well as the Holy Rule, tells
us that we must adopt a view which contradicts that of the secular
world. Learning to do this is neither easy nor fast.

The really hard thing here is that sometimes, even when we are right,
we have to put up and shut up, so to speak. The Rule speaks of
bearing injustice and false brethren. There are no qualifiers here
that say: "You may think it is unjust, but the truth is otherwise."

No, sometimes we must actually endure stuff that really is unjust,
endure people that truly are false. As one very wise old monk of
Pluscarden once said: "Some things will only be fixed by a cross in
the cemetery." That is frighteningly true. Some people, some
dysfunctions will go unchecked and there are only two things one can
do about it: leave or endure.

This may feel like denial to us. It isn't. That's not what's asked of
us. I may think I know very clearly that a person or situation is
wrong, really know it, but what is asked of me is to react in a
particularly controlled fashion, "with a silent mind."

There is a big issue about judgment here. We are not to judge. We
often think we can "assess" when we truly cannot. It is better to
wisely abstain from such "assessments". We never have all the facts
of another person's heart or soul, never. That's why we have been
told not to judge.

Jesus did say, after all, that He is the Truth. He is not calling us
to stupidity or denial, but He can well afford to call us to silent
endurance. The briefest look at Jesus in His Passion can affirm His
rights there. There was never a greater injustice done than that, nor
was there ever a victim so innocent and completely undeserving of all
that brutality.

Why is the "silent mind" such a big deal? Because you cannot get
anywhere spiritually without one. Your focus will be shattered. The
messy bit here is that your focus can be shattered by things
apparently worthwhile- the devil, after all is no amateur at duping us.

We can be tricked into spinning our wheels and expending all our
emotional and spiritual energy on dead ends that look noble, or on
things that truly are noble, but should not absorb all of our efforts
or attention. We can distort our necessary caring and charity into
anger and rage at injustice that does nothing other than perpetrate
anger and rage in more religious attire. Big mistake there! We are
to love, love and always love!

I can recall some awful flame wars on religious lists about religious
topics. Predictably, quite early on the tone stooped to hurling
charges at people, not ideas. Whoops! Wrong way, folks. The holiest
monks I know would not have even entered into that discussion. They
would have smiled and maybe shrugged and gone to their room to read
or pray.

That's not denial, that's a fair assessment that Brother David Gormican,
OSB, (the elderly monk I have in mind,) of Saint Leo would have made
correctly. Br. David was a very, very holy nobody and he knew that. It was a very
freeing knowledge, one I completely lacked when I first lived with him. It
was his strong sense of "nobodiness" that made him someone extremely special
and free.

At 18, I thought entering into heated argument was the thing to do. It was
1967 and there was no shortage of such heat in the monastery or the Church.
Br. David, quite rightly, knew that it would result in a night (or a whole
day) of strife and nothing would be changed. David knew that a hidden
lay brother in Florida was not going to change the Church at all by
fighting with other people who were similarly powerless. Praying,
maybe, but fighting, no! He was humble enough to know this and go to
his room. How I wish I had been that smart- then or now!